With up-to-the-minute amendments to proposed implementing regulations for the Craigville Beach District of Critical Planning Concern piling up, Barnstable Town Council decided last week to postpone action until September.

It was 10:40 p.m. Aug. 6 before the council began its joint public hearing with the planning board on new rules to direct development in the area to maintain its treasured scale and community character.

The council and the board will meet again Sept. 3 in an attempt to settle the matter before the Cape Cod Commission’s Sept. 9 deadline to receive the town-approved regulations.

The DCPC has been the subject of intense negotiations between the town and property owners, not all of it in public sessions. Attorneys hired to represent owners participated in sessions with the town’s growth development staff.

A memo from attorney Eliza Cox, who represents the Long Beach Road Association, was time-dated 5:51 p.m. on the day of last week’s meeting. Addressed to interim growth management director Jo Anne Miller Buntich and town attorney Ruth Weil, it discussed an amendment to the regulations to be presented that evening.

A change from the original proposal would allow owners to rebuild a larger home following a major storm or other catastrophe. Some of the original proponents of the DCPC were left wondering whether the emerging district would address their concerns fully.

“We certainly do not want to see McMansions rising in the aftermath of a hurricane,” said George Gingold of Centerville.

At the meeting, Cox, noting “discussions as late as this afternoon,” said the Long Beach Road Association decided to “conditionally support the DCPC.” That statement was backed up by Association President Jack Driscoll, who thanked Town Manager John Klimm for helping out when the negotiations hit a snag.

“Thank God for the intervention of John Klimm,” said Mark Goldberg of Long Beach Road.

Former town council president Roy Richardson of Centerville, now a member of the Cape Cod Commission, said that at one point attorneys representing Long Beach property owners “decided they’d gone far enough and walked out. From that time on, we were never able to sit down and develop consensus.”

Charles Orr of Long Beach Road said his family has been a presence in Centerville since the 1600s. “ I support restrictions that will preserve the character of Craigville Beach without taking away fundamental rights,” he said. Pointing to three oversized properties he described as “the elephant in the room” that created the push for new zoning, Orr said, “bringing in the DCPC was very unnecessary. Even if these rules pass, the Cape Cod Commission can change regulations whenever they want to.”

Shirley Fisher stated the questions that were increasingly on everyone’s mind: “Does the DCP go far enough? Does it go too far?”